06:35 – Wake up to 37 missed calls from Chris Mason.
07:03 – Quick scroll with my morning pint of black coffee in a crown-stamped pint glass. I am touched to find a message from my patron, Christopher Harborne: “Give me two missed rings when you arrive at the first count. I need to know you’re safe.”
07:30 – Security detail announces it’s time to leave, but there is a delay when one of my decoy Range Rovers is grounded on one of the new retractable perimeter bollards. It takes the six-man advanced milkshake interception unit 30 minutes to resolve it.
08:35 – Arrive at the Queen’s Theatre, Havering, where a journalist from Radio Essex asks if my tireless campaigning to deregulate cryptocurrency is anything to do with the crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne giving me five million pounds. I patiently explain that nothing could be further from the truth and that it’s an innate quality of crypto billionaires that they’re almost entirely motivated by concerns for my safety.
08:38 – Am mobbed in the car park by Reform supporters pleading for selfies. “You say what we’re all thinking, Nige,” says a man in a No Farmers No Food hoody. Neither of us is able to clarify what this means, and having just realised I’ve forgotten my Germoloids, I’m not inclined to try.
08:52 – Reform takes Havering council. I immediately issue a statement hailing this as the biggest political earthquake in modern British history since the last one, and that Reform’s success is the inevitable consequence of ordinary people being ignored by our elites. Leave in a chauffeur-driven car.
09:27 – Enter Basildon Sporting Village, where the party faithful have laid on themed Reform breakfasts of Eggs Patriotic, Eggs Benedict Arnold and Eggs Holinshed’s Chronicles. Preoccupied with the whereabouts of my Germoloids, I opt for the high-fibre ‘sovereign suspension’ option of Bran Flakes made with a can of Guinness.
10:36 – During a head-to-head with Mark Francois on ITN, I claim that the Tories are finished. While we’re on-air, news breaks that the council is headed for no overall control. A jubilant Francois calls it his “personal Dunkirk” and describes his campaign on the ground (Operation Basildon Storm II) as a “highly successful fighting withdrawal under contact.”
10:37 – Security cuts the interview short and implements the Romford Diamond Protocol after the Liberal Democrat candidate for Billericay West is spotted browsing the swimming pool timetable while drinking a banana Yazoo.
11:40 – Heading back to the Range Rovers, I take a call from a confused Lee Anderson, who asks, “Who is this Professor Layman? People keep putting things in ‘layman’s terms’ for me, but I’ve never heard of the shithouse.”
12:12 – Due to net zero, Turkish barbers, and some temporary lights, we get stuck in stationary traffic on the A127. Christopher Harborne messages: “You’re currently very vulnerable. We’ve got a team watching via some repurposed Israeli military satellites, but if you need a £2m advance to cover a mobile command convoy, or even just a new five-bed detached with cinema room, pool and carport, say the word. No strings. Not even tax breaks.”
13:53 – In an example of the sort of can-do attitude we’ll be employing in power, I leverage the gridlock to my advantage and deploy a protection officer to Boots. Unfortunately, the motto of my private military contractor is “Always leave a fallen man”, so when the traffic begins to ease, I have to watch helplessly as a small Boots carrier bag bounces off the bulletproof glass and both it, and the bodyguard, recede in the rear-view mirror.
14:55 – Arrive in Chelmsford just in time to watch Essex County Council turn Teal. Enjoy a celebratory pint with local supporters while the team sweeps the venue for anyone under the age of 40.
14:54 – A tearful Darren Grimes calls. I assume he wants to celebrate Reform taking Sunderland council after 50 years of Labour control, but it turns out he’s lost his Fiat 500 in the Silksworth Community Pool car park.
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Matthew Goodwin’s by-election diary
15:02 – News begins to filter through that we’ve taken 34 seats in Wales. An astonishing result. Dan Thomas invites me to head west down the M4, but it’s been a long day, and I hate the Welsh.
15:18 – I’m beginning to think the day couldn’t get any better when my team hand me a small parcel. They explain that Christopher orchestrated the airlift of a pipe of Germoloids to Cheltenham Town Hall in a commandeered reaper drone.
15:29 – Grinning ear to ear with relief as I’m leaving the bathroom, I run into Zia Yusuf. He immediately abandons our handshake when I explain why.
16:36 – Receive an image of a brick in a puddle. It can mean only one thing. Jonathan Gullis is a councillor again.
18:55 – A long evening of press and media appearances with Fox, Russia Today and the Ilford Recorder. Sadly, the journalist from the latter starts parroting the deep state agenda and asking questions about one of our new councillors, Stuart Prior. Allegedly, Councillor Prior thinks white people are the “master race” and celebrates Punjabi and Sikh women being raped. I am furious, and demand to know why she’s focusing on this matter, rather than the rumours that Zack Polanski wants all Sunday roasts to be supervised by climate officers.
19:42 – Victory speech. After 30 years on the frontline, what a moment. I think this is how Philippe Pétain must have felt in 1940.
20:02 – One last drama. Laura Kuenssberg is wrestled to the floor after waving around a suspicious-looking tube of liquid, but still manages to fire off a question while in a headlock. “Nigel, critics say you’re reshaping everything. Is it difficult being this influential?”
Turns out the tube was her microphone. Team remains vigilant.
21:05 – After six weeks on the campaign trail, and several days without a full night’s sleep, I return to the nearest of my houses, Mar-a-Leyton. And call Christopher to tell him I’m safe.
22:43 – Pork pie. Germoloids. Bed.
*Yes, it’s satire. For more world exclusives from Henry Morris, read his Substack
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